We need new thinking about the operating environment we currently frame as a 'marketplace'. We need a courageous, informed articulation of what is happening now, and the start of the thinking that can move us towards a method of effective working, both for quality of care and the health of our finances.

Right now, water and energy companies have full license to rip you off without consequence. But we can at least tackle outsourcing contracts, where we can decide what to do with public money. This Bill would be a small step in the right direction.

I know that a few public sector bodies are developing collaborative alliances with the voluntary and community sector rather than simply contracting with it. However, in reality, the latter are in a small minority and the trend, sadly, is in the opposite direction.

The taxpayer it seems, doesn't actually like privatisation very much. Successive governments have often been to the right of the taxpayer, outsourcing regardless of a public mandate, not least in the NHS.

In my opinion, a contemporary public sector leader should think very hard and analytically before assuming outsourcing is the most effective and efficacious way of either improving the quality or reducing the cost of public services.

The public service landscape is changing and fast - and not always in ways that the voluntary and community sector would wish to see. Some services are simply disappearing and others are being altered beyond recognition.

Breaking the stranglehold which the handful of large corporate publishers currently have over academics and university libraries is not only important because of the public money at stake, but also because genuine open access allows research to be utilised by those outside the close confines of academia.

What is a person with a conscience to think about the fraught and complex issue of genetic modification (GM)? Picking sides used to be easy: if you were green, you were against GM because it was unnatural and industrial.

Transparency is everything, along with a good proposal and price, and the ability to deliver. I believe in second chances too because there is the learning curve to consider and you are dependent on the buyer to make sure you get the right brief.

Tragically for those whom it is intended to assist, a programme designed in very different economic conditions and based on a belief that market incentives would drive a range of providers to secure long-term employment for those who have been inactive in the labour market for a long period may end up not delivering.

Then economies of scale clearly dictate that SMEs wouldn't be bidding for contracts worth £1.4billion, those figures are only for the big firms. But big firms need revenue or they will shrink to smaller entities, so they have to make a decision 'do we just land one big fish or lots of little ones?'